Italy denies building military base in south Libya

Italy denies building military base in south Libya

The Italian Interior Ministry said Friday it signed an agreement with the UN-proposed Presidential Council about a European Union-funded Italian project to help Tripoli authorities control the Libyan southern borders in order to stem illegal immigrants’ influx.

The Italian news agency Aki said Friday that the agreement will aim to send a mission in order to build a logistic basis for the activities of Libya’s border guards and to allow secured UN organizations presence in the region.

The Italian Interior Minister Marco Minniti and defense, interior and foreign ministries’ delegates from Libya were present in the signing ceremony, Aki added, saying the agreement is based on the Libyan-Italian MoU.

Meanwhile, the head of the joint Libyan-Italian committee for fighting illegal immigration, Tareq Sanbour, denied media news about Italy's intention to build a military base in the south.

Shanbour told Arraed TV Saturday that the media mistranslated the agreement, which he said aims at monitoring southern borders in a center that is run by the Libyan border guards, let alone the service works at the immigration shelter enters.

The Head of the Presidential Council Fayez Al-Sirraj and the Italian Prime Minister Paolo Gentiloni both signed a MoU in last February for control the illegal immigration and human trafficking as well as the southern borders.

The MoU is an activation of an older cooperation agreement signed in Benghazi in 2008 and of Tripoli declaration signed in 2012, according to the media office of Al-Sirraj.